Interfaces
| Two years after buying Perceptive Pixel, Microsoft is ramping up the mass-production of large-screen multi-touch displays. |
| |
Stephen Elop, Microsoft's Executive Vice President of Devices, told attendees of Microsoft's Australian Partner Conference recently that Microsoft was getting ready to "mass produce" large format multi-touch displays.
The announcement comes two years after the acquisition of Jeff Han's Perceptive Pixel Inc. (PPI) by Microsoft.
PPI's large-screen touch displays and interactive whiteboards originally sold in the $80,000 range, but Microsoft has exploring ways to make the displays more affordable.
Microsoft has also been focusing a lot on large format multi-touch as it builds out the Lync Room System with multiple vendors.
When Microsoft bought PPI, the team was folded into Microsoft's Office division because of the synergies between the Office team and PPI around improving teleconferencing technology.
Last year, the Perceptive Pixel team was moved under the Microsoft Devices team. Under Elop's direction, the group is now focused on making the touch-and pen-enabled interface on these devices more useful and more in-line with the "One Windows" work happening across the company.
The work also build on Microsoft's first Surface devices, which were large format interactive multi-touch tables that have faded out of the public consciousness a bit.
| Related articles |
Rumors around Microsoft's acquisition of other large format interactive display companies, like SMART Technologies seem to have faded, as the industry continues to struggle to define a niche and killer app for the devices.
Elop didn't reveal any new details about pricing or distribution during his remarks at the Partner Conference, but the fact he mentioned PPI leads many to suspect that news on the devices is imminent. Alex Wilhelm at TechCrunch hints the announcement may be part of the upcoming release of Windows 9.
SOURCE ZDNet
| By 33rd Square | Embed |
0 comments:
Post a Comment